San Diego: Unfair says Syrian refugee that her brothers can’t come to US from Saudi Arabia

10/07/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

What is wrong with this sob story?

This Syrian family and the brothers left behind were in Saudi Arabia (one of the brothers had already emigrated to S.A.). Saudi Arabia is a safe country! Therefore, why are these people now the responsibility of the US taxpayer? They weren’t living in some sqaulid camp.

They were in arguably the richest country in the Middle East!

SA tent city — So tell us again why Saudi Arabia couldn’t house millions of Muslim refugees in their tent cities reserved for the brief Hajj period? Instead we are taking Syrian ‘refugees’ from S.A.!

From the San Diego Union-Tribune.

It is worth reading the whole article because there are lots of useful nuggets and some important comments by critics of the program (besides the story of a Syrian family that came to the US as ‘refugees’ from Saudi Arabia!)

By the way, I’m sure many of you are saying—yes! If we must have them, keep them in California!

Even though overall arrival numbers in fiscal 2017 dropped by more than half from the previous year, San Diego County continued its legacy as the California county that took in the most refugees.

In a year that began with a promise of more refugees than ever before coming to the U.S. and ended with an ongoing court battle over how many and whom the president could block from coming, about 1,500 refugees resettled in San Diego County, according to data from the State Department. That’s down from just over 3,100 the year before, and it’s the only time that number has dipped below 2,000 in the last decade.

“The fact that we remained the largest county, it definitely makes us proud to continue the tradition of San Diego being a safe haven,” said Etleva Bejko, director of refugee and immigration services for Jewish Family Service, a resettlement agency.

Where refugees resettle once the U.S. agrees to take them is a complicated decision-making process that factors in whether they already have family living here, which agencies have the bandwidth to support them and which places have infrastructure in place to help them succeed. That often means that places like San Diego that already have large populations of people from a country will continue to take refugees from that country. [Multiplier effect! Like Ft. Wayne in my previous post—ed]

San Diego County has been known for leading the state in refugee arrivals since large numbers of Iraqis fleeing war began arriving in late summer of 2007.

Confirmation again! Federal resettlement contractors paid by the head!

Bejko said her organization has had to reorganize support efforts because of the overall decreases in arrivals. Resettlement agencies receive funding based on the number of refugees that they help.

[….]

Three members of the Tarakji family, originally from Damascus, Syria, were some of the few who made it to the U.S. after the travel ban. The slowdown in accepting refugees has separated them from two other members of their family.

Catholic Charities resettled mother Alshifaa Hammoush, 52, father Manaf Tarakji, 58, and daughter Maria Tarakji, 21, in April. Two sons, Yasser Tarakji, 29, and Yaman Tarakji, 27, remain in Saudi Arabia.

They had already been trying to immigrate to the U.S. to reunite with their extended family who live in San Diego County when the war in Syria broke out. [They hit the jackpot because the refugee category is the most desirable way to get into the country. They get their hands held by a federal contractor who helps them get all of their welfare (not available to other categories of legal immigrant)!—ed]

After bombing destroyed the pharmacy where Hammoush worked and scared off Manf Tarakji’s clients for his electronics repair business, and a car exploded outside their building, the family fled in 2013 to Saudi Arabia, where the oldest son was already living and working.

Once in Saudi Arabia, they couldn’t continue the process to get family-sponsored green cards.

They stayed there in limbo, unable to fully establish new lives because they were on visitor visas that they had to renew every three months, until they were accepted as refugees to the U.S. Yaman Tarakji was separated into his own refugee case because of his age, and he is still waiting for processing.

The oldest brother, Yasser Tarakji also tried to apply but never heard back from the U.N. agency that registers refugees.

[….]

Still, separation from the two sons is painful for all of them. Whenever Maria Tarakji looks at photos from their last day together in Saudi Arabia, her eyes wet with tears.

“The U.S. was accepting refugees forever. It’s unfair to do this now,” Maria Tarakji said. “It’s really hard to live here, and our brother is not here.”

She said she’s had to take responsibility for tasks that her brothers used to handle, like choosing an internet router.

Both brothers work in computer programming and repair.

Continue reading here.

See my San Diego archive here. It wasn’t too long ago that we reported that the IRC there was involved in some housing fraud controversy.

Federal contractor removes director of its San Diego office in wake of investigation

09/19/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

See my previous report on what is alleged about the International Rescue Committee (IRC). (This is David Miliband’s organization.)

And, if you are thinking, ho hum, so refugees got placed possibly illegally in inadequate housing (as some of you previously commented), I need to explain why this case is significant.

It is surely not a one-off case, but what is important is that a mainstream media outlet has actually had the nerve to investigate a darling of the left—the US Refugee Admissions Program, and its contractor, the IRC. You might not have sympathy for the refugees, but you should.

Your critical aim should be at the federal policies, the bureaucrats, and the contractors*** hired by the feds to bring the refugees to your towns, not the specific refugees who took advantage of what Congress and the White House have offered them.

We need more investigations (like this one) by mainstream media of questionable practices by the contractors in order to further the education of voting Americans!

Number of bodies resettled, more important than quality of care.

So here is the update from Inewsource.org:

A local refugee resettlement agency is searching for a new executive director little more than a week after the organization’s national office found the affiliate had violated housing policies.

A spokesman for the International Rescue Committee‘s headquarters in New York confirmed David Murphy is no longer the relief agency’s executive director in San Diego, but would not address additional questions. A posting for the position appeared online last week.

Earlier this month, the national office said the San Diego affiliate had engaged in housing placement practices that were “inconsistent” with its policies, but declined to discuss its findings further.

The agency’s statement followed a KPBS investigation first published in July that found seven families, who arrived during a rush of refugees last year, living in El Cajon apartments with more people than were listed on their leases, a potential contract violation.

[….]

The resettlement agency receives a one-time stipend of federal dollars to cover housing and other needs for refugees…

Continue here.

***These are the federal contractors paid by the head for refugee “clients” they place (secretively!) in your towns and cities. Congress should be investigating how they are using the millions of federal dollars they receive annually. The San Diego housing irregularity is, I suspect, the tip of the iceberg!

San Diego IRC office gets slap on wrist from US State Department

09/08/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

I reported the news here. The giant New York City-based International Rescue Committee was found to be placing refugee families in housing that violated local codes and surprise! a local reporter investigated the story.

Screenshot (821)

The original investigation was posted on KPBS (not a rightwing news outlet!).

Over the ten years I’ve been writing about the UN/US Refugee Admissions Program I’ve rarely seen investigations of any of the nine federal refugee resettlement contractors***.

There were a couple of cases elsewhere in the country where a contractor failed to deliver on their DOS contract, left refugees in the lurch in bug infested housing, and where the story was picked up by the mainstream media, but they are rare.

This update by reporter Tarryn Mento is posted at something called inewsource housed, we are told, inside KPBS.

That is where we pick up the story….

The national headquarters of the International Rescue Committee says it has found problems with the way its San Diego branch placed refugees in homes. The announcement follows a KPBS investigation into allegations that refugees were told to sign falsified rental documents to get their large families into apartments.

[….]

In a statement to KPBS Tuesday, the IRC’s national office in New York said: “We unfortunately have identified housing placement practices in San Diego which were inconsistent with the IRC’s policies and code of conduct. In response, we have taken steps to reinforce housing-related policies and practices with local staff and we have engaged with and are supporting families who may have been impacted.”

Of course the arrogant IRC isn’t going to talk! Reporters will learn that secrecy is the watchword when it comes to the placement of refugees.

KPBS repeatedly requested a phone interview with the IRC’s national office to learn more about its findings and how it was helping families, but the agency has not replied. San Diego IRC Executive Director David Murphy has also not responded to requests for comment.

David-Miliband-and-Hillar-001 — In 2014, IRC CEO David Miliband traveled to San Diego and announced that they were sending more Syrians there. Miliband, a pal of Hillary and Bill, is a Brit making decisions for American towns and cities. https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2014/03/01/brit-who-heads-international-rescue-committee-lets-send-some-more-syrians-to-san-diego/

A spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department, which awards federal dollars to resettlement agencies, said in an email that the agency was satisfied with the measures taken by the IRC.

“The State Department requested that IRC conduct a thorough investigation into the allegations, and they have communicated to us that they have taken appropriate action to ‎ensure that all refugees resettled through IRC in San Diego are served in full compliance with all relevant programs, guidelines, and codes,” the spokeswoman said.

The State Department simply took the word of its contractor! (I think the contractors lead the DOS around by the nose!).

But, see what the reporter found out when she went back to the families!

Continue reading here.

One of the stories I hear repeatedly is that the refugee contractors have special inside deals with landlords and owners of inner-city housing. Let’s have some more disinfecting sunshine on that issue!

Tell the President and Congress that the US Refugee Admissions Program should be suspended and the contractors thoroughly investigated!

*** For new readers, these are the Federal contractors/middlemen/employment agencies/propagandists/lobbyists/community organizers? paid by you to place refugees in your towns and cities listed below. Under the nine major contractors are hundreds of subcontractors.

The contractors income is largely dependent on taxpayer dollars based on the number of refugees admitted to the US, but they also receive myriad grants to service their “New Americans.”

If you are a good-hearted soul and think refugee resettlement is all about humanitarianism, think again! Big businesses/global corporations depend on the free flow of cheap (some call it slave) labor. It is for this reason that Republican leaders of Congress are supportive of an uninterrupted flow of refugees into America.

The only way for real reform of how the US admits refugees is to remove these contractors/Leftwing activists/big business head hunters from the process.

El Cajon again! Refugee contractor accused of skirting housing rules when placing large families

08/10/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Sheesh! A few minutes ago we told you about the huge US refugee contractor—the IRC—working with Starbucks to find refugee employees to make your morning coffees in the San Diego area, and up pops more news (not good news!) about the IRC there.

https://www.rescue.org/united-states/san-diego-ca

This sort of news will result in a cry for more start-up money for refugees. It will never result in formal questions being asked by Congress about whether we are bringing in more refugees than we can afford!

From KPBS San Diego:

Three large refugee families that a local nonprofit helped resettle at an El Cajon apartment complex are being asked to move because they have too many people living in their homes.

Uh-oh!

They came forward after KPBS aired an investigation nearly two weeks ago about other refugee families who said the same resettlement agency — the International Rescue Committee in San Diego — put them into too-small apartments by encouraging them to sign leases that omitted the names of some occupants.

IRC’s national office in New York has said it is investigating the recent claims made by refugees. In an email Tuesday, a spokesman said the office is aware of the new cases, which it is also looking into, “and is supporting our clients through their next steps.”

What say you, David? IRC CEO David Miliband giving George Soros their highest award in 2013. https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2013/11/09/federal-refugee-contractor-gives-freedom-award-to-george-soros/

The three families, who moved into their two-bedroom apartments last year, said they received the 30-day notices to vacate a day after KPBS’s story was published on July 27. A manager for the complex, which is under new ownership, said only five people are allowed in a two-bedroom apartment. Two of the families have eight members, while another has seven.

Lalmir Hamdard, a refugee from Afghanistan who arrived here in September, said he relied on an IRC translator to help him sign the English-language lease. A copy of the document provided to KPBS showed five names on the lease instead of all eight members of his family.

“At the time, I didn’t understand it in English — even my daughters with little English didn’t understand,” he said in Farsi through a translator. “I only understood that it said here, ‘Write this, sign here, do this.’ And I did.”

Two neighboring Syrian families who speak Arabic shared similar stories. They would have to find a three-bedroom apartment, which would be more expensive, and they are already having trouble keeping up with rent on their two-bedroom units. However, even a larger apartment may not be big enough depending on a complex’s policy.

More here.

Nice to see some real investigative journalism for a change, but reporter needs to ask….

Where is the US State Department that oversees agreements with its contractors (the IRC is one of nine that contracts with the federal government to place refugees) which surely include rules about how many tenants are in each apartment or house?

We have a huge archive on the IRC and its head honcho—David Miliband—here. Go here to see my latest financial accounting for the IRC.

Will Starbucks test new refugee employees for TB (San Diego off the charts)?

08/10/2017 ~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Michael Patrick Leahy at Breitbart called Starbucks to see if new refugee hires (see my post earlier) will be tested for TB as part of their employment screening. Surprise! No response!

From Breitbart:

Starbucks held a hiring event exclusively for refugees in El Cajon, California on Tuesday, part of its recently announced commitment to hire more than 10,000 refugees over the next five years.

See NBC7 report here about the event at the IRC office. Afghans, Syrians, and Somalis will be making your coffees. http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/california/Starbucks-Holds-Refugee-Hiring-Event-in-El-Cajon–439292923.html

El Cajon is located in San Diego County, where more than 20,000 refugees have have been resettled by the federal government in the past nine and a half years since the beginning of Fiscal Year 2008.

A 2013 study from a research team led by Dr. Timothy Rodwell, “an associate professor and physician in the Division of Global Health at UCSD [University of California at San Diego]” that “analyzed data from LTBI [latent tuberculosis infection] screening results of 4,280 refugees resettled in San Diego County between January 2010 and October 2012,” noted that “San Diego County, in California, is a leading refugee resettlement site, and it also has one of the highest rates of active TB in the country, with an incidence rate of 8.4 cases per 100 000 people in 2011.”

[….]

In other words, the incidence of active TB among the 4,280 refugees who were resettled in San Diego County between January 2010 and October 2012 was 327 per 100,000, more than 100 times greater than the incidence of active TB among the entire population of the United States in 2016.

Wow! I didn’t know this next bit! Refugee contractors*** repeatedly tell the public that only those with latent TB are admitted to the US, but even if that is all we are admitting, that is still a risk for public health.

About four percent of the entire population of the United States tests positive for latent TB infection. Around 10 percent of those with LTBI will develop active TB at some point in their lives. The triggering mechanism to activate latent TB is not entirely understood, but high levels of stress, crowded living situations, poor public health practices, the presence of other diseases that lower the immune system, and behavioral conduct–such as smoking–appear to increase the chances of activation.

The 21.4 percent of refugees in the San Diego County study who tested positive for latent TB infection is about five times the national average.

Breitbart News contacted Starbucks to learn if their refugee hiring process will include mandatory testing for latent and active TB, but has not received a response.

Of course not!

Continue reading here.

See my ‘health issues’ category with hundreds of posts on refugee health problems including mental health issues.

For those who ask me all the time—what can I do? Write to the White House and tell the Prez to tighten up admission requirements for migrants with communicable diseases. If terrorism doesn’t scare you, TB might!

*That video. After I watched the video linked under screen shot photo above, I kept getting an error message when attempting to open the link. I hope that doesn’t happen for you. If it does, search for: ‘Starbucks holds hiring event for refugees’ and it should be listed for NBC.

*** For new readers, the International Rescue Committee is one of the Federal contractors/middlemen/employment agencies/propagandists/lobbyists/community organizers? paid by you to place refugees in your towns and cities listed below. Under the nine major contractors are hundreds of subcontractors.

The contractors income is largely dependent on taxpayer dollars based on the number of refugees admitted to the US, but they also receive myriad grants to service their “New Americans.”

If you are a good-hearted soul and think refugee resettlement is all about humanitarianism, think again! Big businesses/global corporations like Starbucks depend on the free flow of cheap (some call it slave) labor.

And, I have a question for you: As a volunteer are you given instructions on how to spot communicable diseases like TB in the refugee community you are helping? (See symptoms at left).

The only way for real reform of how the US admits refugees is to remove these contractors/Leftwing activists/big business head hunters from the process.